Didn't mean to sound argumentative about it - I use PI for 95% of my work and would highly recommend it - considering the price it is fantastic. I'm still glad that I have Photoshop because occasionally there are brushes, actions and styles available for Photoshop that just can't be duplicated quickly in PI - given the time, I think PI can do everything that Photoshop can, but the number of free add-ons is considerably less. And although PI theoretically supports Photoshop plug-ins, many of the more powerful ones won't work as well (if at all) in PI. Photoshop has more filter options and gives greater manual control of many features such as morphing (think Goo), sharpening, blur, stroking along a path etc. but it is less "automated" so that makes it more difficult to use - a double-edged sword. I would also agree that a newcomer can live without these advanced features, but eventually there might be a need for them. Another program that I really like and use more often than PS but not as often as PI is Painter - it can really make some stunning seamless textures as well as create curving patterned borders that follow the curvature of a template. Kind of like text along curves in PI, but with bitmaps (image hoses - tubes, whatever). I can't seem to get the same results in PS or PI, so that is when I use Painter. I would hate to have to do without any of them, but if I had to choose and have only ONE of them, it would be PhotoImpact without a doubt!